I was forced to buy a designer perfume to attend a 7-year-old’s birthday party – some items on the gift list were £250
A COLOURING book, some cheap bracelets, toys - some of the items you'd typically gift a young kid.
But one parent has shared their shock after being forced to fork out for a designer perfume to attend the birthday party of a seven-year-old.
Looking through the posh gift catalogue, it also included a Barbie DreamHouse for an eye-watering £250, a Barbie camper van for over £50, as well as a designer handbag and a £200 gift experience.
''My first emotion was shock, before anger set in,'' wrote the mother whose daughter goes to the same school as the birthday girl.
''There was a QR code on the cute cardboard invitation, which I had to scan to confirm my attendance.
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''So far, so normal for children’s parties these days. But when I clicked “send”, I was automatically taken to another page called thingstogetme.com.''
At first, the parent confessed, they assumed ''it was an advertisement or a joke''.
Unfortunately, she soon realised that it was neither - but rather ''an act of breathtaking audacity'' that left them beyond stunned and furious.
Although the mum, who works as a teacher, was concerned about the impact such lavish presents could have ''on a class, creating jealousy, resentment, and an obsession with consumerism'', she was aware that others thought ''differently''.
This was proved once again ten months later when she received three more invitations with what she claimed to be ''similar gift lists''.
The family live in ''a lovely part of Kent'' - but it couldn't necessarily be described as ''overly wealthy or ostentatious''.
The children, it was revealed, go to a ''local state primary school, where there is a mix of stay-at-home mums and working mums with professional careers''.
For a good while, the usual and accepted gift etiquette was to arrive with a book, sweets or hair ties, all costing less than a tenner - however, that no longer seems to be the case, they added.
''These wish lists work exactly like a wedding gift registry. You select the item you want (or feel compelled to) purchase, order and pay for it online, and have it shipped to your home or directly to the birthday boy or girl’s home.''
When the first invite arrived, the mother, ''feeling cornered'', picked what was the cheapest item on the list - a bottle of Marc Jacobs perfume, costing them £25.
The unwritten rules of kids parties
Mum-of-two and Fabulous Digital Editor Lydia Major sticks to 5 fail-safe rules for any kids party.
''It'd be fair to say I'm not particularly au fait with child-led parenting,' explains Lydia.
''I like rules & I like discipline, otherwise (and this might just be my boys) kids run riot! So when it comes to attending a kids party I have 5 rules I like to stick by to make sure a) we hopefully don't get blacklisted and b) all the kids get the same.
Here they are:
- Never spend more and £10 on a gift: The likelihood is the gift will get opened, shoved in a pile and forgotten about.
- Always reply to an invite promptly: This is just basic manners and your kids need to learn them too.
- Never expect that siblings can ''come along'': If they WERE invited the host would say, trust me!
- Don't 'dump and go' unless the invite says so: Some parties are drop offs, some aren't. Read the small print. If they aren't, don't ask another mum to 'watch little Timmy' because the likelihood is little Timmy will have a nose bleed on the bouncy castle and you'll get blamed.
- Always say thank you and get your kid to say it too: Kids parties aren't cheap and they take A LOT of brain space to organise. So make sure you find a moment to say a face-to-face thank you to the hosting parents. Again, it's just basic manners.
But there was another totally bizarre detail on the invitation - a section where parents, who couldn't ''afford the items on the list'', ''could send cash'' instead.
The outrageous list soon became the hottest topic on the WhatsApp group where fellow mums shared their ''horror''.
Despite the outrage, the seven mums ''reluctantly lined up, not wanting to break ranks for fear of being judged by the boy’s parents or even the birthday girl herself''.
More specifically, the parent added, they didn't want their kids ''to be judged if they didn’t buy one of the stipulated gifts''.
The first invitation - the one with the Barbie DreamHouse - allegedly came from one of the wealthiest families who ''live in a big house and the mother runs her own yoga studio while the father is a family doctor''.
The birthday bash, it was revealed, was ''an expensive spa-themed party'', where the little girls got treated to a fancy manicure.
Soon came another invitation to a party - this time, with the mum buying a perfume once again, as it was the cheapest item on the list - but things changed when one of the kids was invited to the third bash.
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''Coming to the party knowing I had ignored the list brought me enormous satisfaction and opened the floodgates as my friends followed suit.
''Again, we didn’t even get a thank you note, but I didn’t care. I staked out my territory.''